The Telecommunications Act of 1996 required cable/satellite companies to allow non-cable company provided devices, such as, third party set-top boxes and cable card ready television sets, to access their networks. As a result, the cable industry produced a cable card. A cable card is a plug-in card approximately the size of a credit card that allows consumers to view cable television on generic set top boxes or on some televisions without the use of a set-top box. Cable card support is most common on higher end televisions that include a special slot for the cable card and a built-in cable tuner. The cable card acts like a unique “key” to unlock the channels and services to which the cable customer has subscribed.